Thursday, December 21, 2006

Cowher on the Way Out? Who Will Replace Him? Let the Rumors Begin!

In 1969, 36-year old Chuck Noll was chosen to serve as head coach of the moribund Pittsburgh Steelers and the rest was history. Twenty-three years later, in December of 1991, Mr. Noll announced that he would be stepping down at the end of that season; and the conjecture as to who would replace the greatest NFL coach of the 1970s began almost immediately.

The list of candidates, according to media reports at the time, was pretty impressive even in hindsight: Mike Holmgren (San Francisco Offensive Coordinator at the time), Vince Tobin (Chicago Defensive Coordinator), Dave Wannstedt (Dallas Defensive Coordinator), Richie Petitbone (Washington Defensive Coordinator), Pete Carroll (years away from his success at USC, he was the Defensive Coordinator for the New York Jets), Joe Green (who was on Chuck Noll's staff at the time), and Bill Cowher (Defensive Coordinator at Kansas City).

As everyone knows 34-year old Bill Cowher was tabbed to be Mr. Noll's replacement, and the rest has been history.

Is Bill Cowher going to be coaching his final home game in Pittsburgh this Sunday? Only time will tell, but if that turns out to be the case here are the resumes of some of the coaches (listed alphabetically) all of us are going to be hearing about as possible, external candidates (along with their respective ages) to serve as the Steelers' third head coach in thirty-eight years:

From this list Tim Lewis is a lock to get an interview, after all he is a legitimate minority candidate. Meanwhile the inclusion here of Pete Carrol is, of course, the worst kind of rumor mongering (and the fact that it is included in a posting that is built upon unsustantiated supposition -- i.e. that Bill Cowher is leaving Pittsburgh at the end of this season -- makes it all the worse), but there have been rumors off-and-on for the last three years that Mr. Carroll could be lured back to the NFL. Of course, he might have to take a pay cut to get the Steelers' job.